The three-week old stand-off between the management of Maruti Suzuki and workers of Manesar continued unabated on Monday. Any resolution looked bleak since three of the worker?s chief negotiators ? Shiv Kumar, Sonu Gujjar and Ravinder Kumar ? were arrested on Sunday night. According to sources, the Gurgaon police rejected their bail appeal on Monday and sent them to 14-day judicial custody.
?Who do we negotiate with?? an exasperated Maruti Suzuki official said. The three were arrested on grounds of intimidation and assault on co-workers who were unwilling to join the protests. According to the source, the two sides had brokered peace on Saturday midnight and were about to announce the breakthrough when the striking workers suddenly changed their stance.
?We had agreed to take back a chunk of the suspended workers into the company if they were willing to sign the good conduct bond,? he said.
Since the labour stir erupted on August 29, Maruti has suspended and dismissed as many as 62 workers. ?We assured the workers that while 44 dismissals would be converted into suspension, the remaining 18 trainees would be immediately recruited back. Even this was suddenly not acceptable to the workers,? the company source quoted above said.
A worker at Manesar who has been protesting outside the Maruti Suzuki factory at Manesar said that the workers would not sign the bond. ?Why should we sign the bond? What we have told the company is that we are ready to resume production at the earliest and would do our job perfectly. But for that the company has to take back the workers suspended,? he said.
The worker, quoted above who did not want to be named, also said that even though three of their leaders have been arrested there were others with whom the company could negotiate. ?Our leaders were wrongfully arrested by the police on Sunday. Even though they are behind bars we could still reach a resolution,? he said.
Meanwhile, Maruti Suzuki in a scathing statement on Monday said that the company management, representatives of the Haryana government and labour department had made efforts to reach a consensus to end the deadlock but to no avail.
?The management had started the talks with the aim of arriving at a solution, and made efforts to achieve positive progress. However, talks failed on Sunday night as striking workers repeatedly changed their position on key issues, making it impossible to reach a settlement. They also made unreasonable demands such as asking the management to take back people who had indulged in violence and attacked company officials,? the statement said.
The company is trying to communicate with workers to accept the good conduct bond to be able to restart production. ?It will encourage workers to sign the good conduct bond, and resume duties without any fear and work towards restoring normalcy. The management continues to believe that most of the workers are sincere. They are being misled,? the company said. On Monday Maruti Suzuki produced 600 units of the Swift.